{"id":4694,"date":"2017-08-24T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2017-08-23T22:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/evolve.rabatmalta.com\/?guid=3c58a4ee149cdf648e34ee71eb36948e"},"modified":"2017-08-24T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2017-08-23T22:00:00","slug":"gimp-2-9-6-released","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/evolve.rabatmalta.com\/?p=4694","title":{"rendered":"GIMP 2.9.6\u00a0Released"},"content":{"rendered":"

After more than a year of hard work we are excited to release GIMP<\/span> 2.9.6
\nfeaturing many improvements, some new features, translation updates for 23
\nlanguages, and 204 bug fixes.<\/p>\n

As usual, for a complete list of changes please see
\nNEWS<\/span><\/a>. Here we’d like to focus
\non the most important changes.<\/p>\n

Performance¶<\/a><\/h2>\n

GIMP<\/span> now has support for experimental multi-threading in GEGL<\/span> and will try to
\nuse as many cores as are available on your computer.<\/p>\n

We know GIMP<\/span> can explode when using more than one core, but we keep it that way
\nso that we get as many bug reports as possible for this officially unstable
\ndevelopment version. This is because we really, really want to ship GIMP<\/span> 2.10
\nwith usable parallel processing.<\/p>\n

On the other hand, you can always set the amount of cores to 1 if you couldn’t
\nbe bothered to report bugs. For that, please tweak the amount of threads on the
\nSystem Resources<\/em> page of the Preferences<\/em> dialog.<\/p>\n

\n \"Setting
\n<\/figure>\n

GUI<\/span>, Usability, and Configurability¶<\/a><\/h2>\n

Benoit Touchette improved mask creation workflow for users who use a ton of
\nmasks in their projects. Now GIMP<\/span> remembers the last type of mask
\ninitialization, and you can use key modifiers + mouse click on layer previews
\nto create, apply, or remove masks. There\u2019s a new button in the Layers<\/em>
\ndockable dialog for that as well.<\/p>\n

\n \"Easily
\n<\/figure>\n

To make that feature possible, Michael Natterer introduced saving of last
\ndialogs’ settings across sessions and made these defaults configurable via the
\nnew Interface \/ Dialog Defaults<\/em> page in the Preferences<\/em> dialog.<\/p>\n

\n \"Configurable
\n<\/figure>\n

Additionally, the Preferences<\/em> dialog got a vertical scrollbar where
\napplicable to keep its height more sensible, and settings on individual pages
\nof the dialog can be reset separately now.<\/p>\n

The Quit<\/em> dialog got a few updates: automatically exiting when all the images
\nin the list have been saved, and a Save As<\/em> button for every opened image
\n(clicking an image in the list will raise it easy checks).<\/p>\n

\n \"Configurable
\n<\/figure>\n

Yet another new feature is an option (on the screenshot above) to choose fill
\ncolor or pattern for empty spaces after resizing the canvas.<\/p>\n

Better Hi-DPI<\/span> Support¶<\/a><\/h2>\n

While most changes for better Hi-DPI<\/span> displays support are planned for v3.0, when
\nGIMP<\/span> is expected to be based on either GTK<\/span>+3 or GTK<\/span>+4, we were able to remove at
\nleast some of the friction by introducing icon sizes at different resolutions
\nand a switch for icon sizes on the Icon Theme<\/em> page of the Preferences<\/em> dialog.<\/p>\n

\n \"Configurable
\n<\/figure>\n

On-canvas Interaction Changes¶<\/a><\/h2>\n

Michael Natterer did a huge under-the-hood work that is likely to affect user
\ninteraction with GIMP<\/span> bigly. Simply put, he moved a lot of on-canvas code
\nfrom tools like Rectangle Select<\/em>, Measure<\/em> and Path<\/em> into reusable code.<\/p>\n

The effect of that is multifold:<\/p>\n